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Bruce Springsteen: Greatest Hits

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Columbia Records
Released: 1995.02.28
Time:
 76:78
Category: Pop/Rock
Producer(s): See Artists ...
Rating: *********. (9/10)
Media type: CD
Web address: www.brucespringsteen.net
Appears with:
Purchase date: 1997.12.06
Price in €: 18,99



 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


[1] Born to Run (B.Springsteen) - 4:30
[2] Thunder Road (B.Springsteen) - 4:48
[3] Badlands (B.Springsteen) - 4:02
[4] The River (B.Springsteen) - 5:00
[5] Hungry Heart (B.Springsteen) - 3:20
[6] Atlantic City (B.Springsteen) - 3:56
[7] Dancing in the Dark (B.Springsteen) - 4:03
[8] Born in the U.S.A. (B.Springsteen) - 4:41
[9] My Hometown (B.Springsteen) - 4:12
[10] Glory Days (B.Springsteen) - 3:49
[11] Brilliant Disguise (B.Springsteen) - 4:15
[12] Human Touch (B.Springsteen) - 5:10
[13] Better Days (B.Springsteen) - 3:44
[14] Streets of Philadelphia (B.Springsteen) - 3:16
[15] Secret Garden (B.Springsteen) - 4:27
[16] Murder Incorporated (B.Springsteen) - 3:57
[17] Blood Brothers (B.Springsteen) - 4:34
[18] This Hard Land (B.Springsteen) - 4:51

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


Bruce Springsteen - Vocals, Acoustic & Electric Guitars, Harmonica, Keyboards, Bass, Percussion, Producer, Liner Notes

Steve Van Zandt - Acoustic & Electric Guitars, Mandolin, Background Vocals
Nils Lofgren - Guitar
Clarence Clemons - Saxophone, Percussion, Background Vocals
Roy Bittan - Piano, Fender Rhodes, Keyboards, Synthesizer, Glockenspiel, Background Vocals
Danny Federici - Piano, Organ, Keyboards, Glockenspiel, Background Vocals
David Sancious - Keyboards
Garry Tallent - Bass, Background Vocals
Randy Jackson - Bass
Ernest "Boom" Carter - Drums
Max Weinberg - Drums, Percussion, Background Vocals
Patti Scialfa - Background Vocals

Producers:
Bruce Springsteen, Mike Appel (track 1); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Mike Appel (track 2); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau (track 3); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Steve Van Zandt (tracks 4-5); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Chuck Plotkin, Steve Van Zandt (tracks 7-10, 16); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Chuck Plotkin (tracks 11, 13, 15, 17-18); Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Chuck Plotkin, Roy Bittan (track 12); Bruce Springsteen, Chuck Plotkin (track 14).

Engineers:
Louis Lahav (track 1); Jimmy Iovine (tracks 2-3); Neil Dorfsman (tracks 4-5); Toby Scott (tracks 7-18).

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


1995 LP Columbia 67060
1995 CS Columbia 67060
1995 CD Columbia 67060
1995 CD Columbia 4785552
2005 CD Sony Japan 738

"Streets Of Philadelphia" won 1995 Grammy Awards for Song Of The Year, Best Male Rock Vocal Performance, Best Rock Song and Best Song Written Specifically For A Motion Picture Or For Television. "Streets Of Philadelphia" was also nominated for Record Of The Year.

You can grumble about the early romps that aren't here - what, no "Rosalita"? - or about your favorite B-side not being included, but the fact is these are the songs that have lasted through Bruce Springsteen's first two decades, and you could hardly ask for more Springsteen on a single disc. This really is the cream.

The four blockbusters that open GREATEST HITS weren't actually hits - "Born To Run" peaked at #23 on the charts, "Badlands" didn't break the top 40, and the other two weren't singles at all - but they laid down the rules for all the hits that followed and they've remained concert and rock radio staples. "Born To Run" wraps a restless American dream into one of the most rollicking rock 'n' roll singles ever made; the latter couple find the dreamer waking up and finding real folk struggling with that dream everywhere he looks. What follows is one of the greatest strings of singles to ever deal head-on with that confrontation between dreams and realities.

The four new songs on GREATEST HITS find Springsteen finally finding a way to incorporate his E Street Band - which hadn't performed on a studio album for 11 years before this - into his current infatuation with mellower, though no less hard-hitting rock. "Murder Incorporated" is actually an E Street outtake from 1982, and it's an all-out, searing track. The others, all 1995 recordings (though "This Hard Land" was also written in the early eighties) form a cycle about unrealized dreams, in love, friendship and life.



Compiling a greatest-hits collection for Bruce Springsteen should be an easy task, yet Greatest Hits manages to miss the mark. Nothing from his first two albums is included, and the set includes such non-hits like "Atlantic City" and "The River" instead of hits like "Cover Me," "Tunnel of Love," and "Fade Away." In fact, a good portion of his hits are missing, as are important album tracks like "Backstreets," "Rosalita," and "Candy's Room," making this neither a straight hits collection nor a compilation of his best tracks. What's left are some of his biggest hits and best songs ("Born to Run," "Glory Days," "The River"), but not all of them, as well as four new tracks, the best of which is an outtake from the Born in the U.S.A. sessions ("Murder Incorporated"). Aside from "Murder Incorporated," the new tracks follow the synth-laden adult contemporary direction Springsteen began pursuing with "Streets of Philadelphia," only without the lyricism or melody. So, it's a mixed bag, drawing an incomplete portrait of one of the prime rockers of the '70s and '80s. Casual fans would be better served by Born in the U.S.A., which encompasses all of Springsteen's sides.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine - All Music Guide



Exclusive Review from Rolling Stones:

Bruce Springsteen is a peerless songwriter and consummate artist whose every painstakingly crafted album serves as an impassioned and literate pulse taking of a generation's fortunes. He is the foremost live performer in the history of rock & roll, a self-described prisoner of the music he loves, for whom every show is played as if it might be his last. Though some may argue the point, Springsteen single-handedly rescued rock & roll from its banal post-'60s doldrums. Moreover, his music developed a conscience that didn't ignore the darkening of the runaway American dream as the country greedily blundered its way through the '80s.

With the mighty exception of "Born in the U.S.A.," however - a veritable greatest-hits album in itself - Springsteen's standing as a singles artist has seemed an incidental byproduct of his main focus: arraying his songs in theme-driven album-length statements. For this reason, "Greatest Hits" comes across as a collection of familiar songs, each stellar in its own right, that somehow adds up to something less than the sum of its parts - even with the grafted-on bonus of four new tracks recorded with the E Street Band.

First of all, this album is not even what it purports to be. A straightforward program of Springsteen's greatest hits would at least have had the virtue of a governing logic. Although some Bruce-smitten critic blessed with second sight will no doubt divine a wishful thesis about the "story" it tells, the simple fact is that "Greatest Hits" liberally violates its stated premise. Absent for reasons unfathomable are five Top 10 hits ("Cover Me," "I'm Goin' Down," "I'm on Fire," "War" and "Tunnel of Love"), as well as such essential charting singles as "Prove It All Night" (No. 33), "Fade Away" (No. 20) and "One Step Up" (No. 13). Also missing is anything preceding "Born to Run," which leaves out a big chunk of the Springsteen story. If the album's assemblers could find reason to include "Atlantic City," which failed to crack the Top 100, surely there was room for "Blinded by the Light" and "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)." Those, too, rank among his greatest hits - ask anyone partial to FM radio or Springsteen concerts - despite the lack of corroboration from the charts.

In the early years of his career, a whole new palette of possibilities emerged from Springsteen's energetic vision - a playful, swinging landscape in which Bob Dylan met Roy Orbison at the Jersey Shore to a soundtrack produced by Phil Spector. All of that seemed to sour after "Born to Run" as Springsteen simultaneously fought a bruising legal battle with a former manager and tasted superstardom freighted with its share of hype. Thereafter, he began taking ever more penetrating and disillusioned looks into the troubled American psyche. His melancholy songs were often so intimate and personal (witness "Nebraska") that the E Street Band eventually seemed an encumbrance, though he puffed out his chest for tours with them after the releases of "Born in the U.S.A." and "Tunnel of Love." In hindsight, "Greatest Hits" documents Springsteen's discomfort with the spotlight, the diminishing role of the E Street Band in his music and his rueful view of lives disintegrating against a backdrop of red, white and blues. After a certain point, he didn't want to be the Boss anymore.

By lining up a batch of Springsteen's biggest radio tracks, "Greatest Hits" unintentionally reveals a creaky, leaden quality that occasionally crept into the music he made in the post-"Born to Run" era. Plucked out of context, such popular hits as "Hungry Heart" and "Born in the U.S.A." sound stiff and muscle-bound now. The former is weighted by awkward lyrics ("Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack") that sentimentalize abandonment, the latter grinds a ponderous riff into the ground, and both are stamped with a metronomic snare sound that's leagues removed from the natural swing of the band circa "The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle." The notion occurs that "Better Days," featuring one of Springsteen's most thoughtful lyrics, would have benefited from a subtler vocal treatment than the histrionic growl sustained throughout. And spanning 20 years, isolated from the albums that gave them meaning, these songs don't mix particularly well, nor do they portray a remarkable career in a flattering or accurate light. Every album Springsteen has made is best heard in toto; this vivisection is largely for dilettantes, come-latelies and radio programmers who wouldn't delve deeply anyway.

As for the four unreleased songs - three of them newly recorded with the E Street Band for this project - they sound more like a final coda than a new beginning. Two of them, "Secret Garden" and "Blood Brothers," are so restrained that the E Streeters' involvement adds nothing that session musicians couldn't have provided just as well with their competent anonymity. On "Blood Brothers," a barely electrified folk tune that recalls Dylan's "Blood on the Tracks," Springsteen's harmonica is featured far more prominently than Clarence Clemons' sax or Nils Lofgren's guitar. The uptempo songs - "Murder Incorporated" and "This Hard Land"- don't restore or redefine the band members' roles in any way that suggests they have a future together. "Murder Incorporated" (originally recorded in 1982 and remixed for this album) is broad and bombastic enough to be a hit, while "This Hard Land" repeats some of Springsteen's most pronounced tics - the use of rivers, seeds and rides as metaphors, the contrived device of addressing his words to some fictional "sir." Musically, it begs comparison with Woody Guthrie's populist folk songs.

This may, in fact, be where Springsteen is headed. It wouldn't be surprising if, on his next travels, he walked alone with a guitar and harmonica for companions.

PARKE PUTERBAUGH (RS 705)
Copyright (c) 1968-1998 Rolling Stone Network. All Rights Reserved.
Rolling Stone Network



"...Arranged chronologically, the set winds its way through Springsteen's musical and emotional journey. It's still an invigorating trip..." - Rating: B+

Entertainment Weekly 3/10/95, pp.66-67



About as complete a selection of fan and artist favorites as any single-disc Bruce collection could be, this is a surprisingly coherent listen given the many stylistic and attitudinal shifts it charts. The inclusion of only four of Born in the U.S.A.'s seven Top 10 entries leaves space for less obvious choices like "Atlantic City" and four new cuts, among them songs recorded by a briefly reunited E Street Band. The pace lags a bit near the end - "Secret Garden" is turgid enough to take its place on a Sting album - but Greatest Hits earns its place in the car CD player with stuff like "Born to Run," "The River" and "Dancing in the Dark."

Rickey Wrig - Amazon.com



Eintagsfliegen ziehen oft nach anderthalb Alben Bilanz. Der Kontrast: Bruce Springsteen. Mal abgesehen von der Live-Box ließ "The Boss" zwei Dekaden bis zu dieser Kollektion verstreichen. Dementsprechend gut abgehangen sind Klassiker wie Born To Run, Badlands oder Born In The U.S.A. Klar, bei 18 Songs fehlen viele Favoriten; erfreulich: Das unterschätzte Album Nebraska ist mit Atlantic City vertreten, Streets Of Philadelphia ebenfalls dabei. Die Überraschung sind vier Stücke mit der E Street Band: eines unveröffentlicht, drei ganz neu (!) - Rocker und Balladen. ** Klang.: 02-04

© Audio



Der "Boß" überbrückt die Wartezeit bis zum Erscheinen eines neuen Studioalbums in branchenüblicher Art und Weise mit einer "Greatest Hits"-Sammlung. als zusätzlichen Kaufanreiz gibt es vier bisher unveröffentlichte Songs. Erwartungsgemäß findet man auf der vorliegenden Kopplung die bekanntesten Titel von Bruce Springsteen - darunter "Born To Run", "Born In The U.S.A." und "Dancing In The Dark", die sämtlich während seiner Glanzzeit bis Mitte der 80er Jahre hohe Chartsnotierungen erreichten. "Cover Me" oder "Tunnel Of Love" sucht man allerdings vergebens. Aus jüngster Zeit strahlt das Grammy-prämierte "Streets Of Philadelphia" besonders hell. Der echte Fan des Rockpoeten aus New Jersey hat natürlich alle diese Titel, aber auch er wird das "Greatest Hits"-Album erwerben müssen - wegen der Zugaben. "Murder Incorporated", ein Outtake der "Born In the U.S.A."-Sessions, kursierte bis dato nur auf Bootlegs. Die restlichen drei Songs sind neu (sie entstanden im Januar 1995), und sie wurden - das ist die eigentliche Sensation der Platte - wieder mit der originalen E Street Band eingespielt. "Secret Garden" erinnert in der Atmosphäre an "Streets Of Philadelphia", "Blood Brothers" geriet sehr reflektiv, "This Hard Land" wiederum kommt mit ordentlichem Druck. Das Booklet dürfte jeden Fan entzücken. Springsteen liefert hier handgeschriebene Kommentare zu jedem Song.

© Stereoplay



Here's the challenge in putting together a Bruce Springsteen compilation: Though he scored 18 Top 40 hits (12 of which made the Top Ten) through 1994, Springsteen is not a "singles artist." Some of his biggest hits have come with his slightest or least characteristic material; he has written numerous songs that were hits for other artists; and some of his most memorable songs were not released as singles. While a Springsteen "hits" collection logically would contain such Top Ten singles as "I'm on Fire" and his cover of Edwin Starr's "War, " few Springsteen fans would miss their omission; on the other hand, many would support the inclusion of "Blinded by the Light" and "Pink Cadillac, " Top Ten hits for Manfred Mann's Earth Band and Natalie Cole; and anyone even remotely familiar with Springsteen's albums and concerts would have trouble countenancing the absence of such non-singles as "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" and "Thunder Road." Facing this challenge, Springsteen has adopted his own set of criteria: First, he seems to have wanted to pack as much music onto a single disc as possible (the result, a CD-busting 76:47 running time); second, he seems to have wanted to include as many tracks as possible, even if that means editing songs (the result, 18 tracks are included, though five have been substantially shortened - "My Hometown" [by 24 seconds], "Glory Days" [by 29 seconds], "Human Touch" [by 82 seconds], "Better Days" [by 23 seconds], and "Streets of Philadelphia" [by 60 seconds]); third, like many artists, he is more interested in including his recent material than his older material (the result, there is nothing from Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. or The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle - no "Blinded by the Light, " "Spirit in the Night, " "4th of July, Asbury Park [Sandy], " or "Rosalita [Come Out Tonight]" - but both sides of his 1992 single "Human Touch"/"Better Days" are included); fourth, he has not felt bound to interpret the album's title to mean he must include his most successful singles the Top 40 hits "Prove It All Night, " "One Step Up" and the Top Tens "Cover Me, " "I'm on Fire, " "I'm Goin' Down, " "War, " and "Tunnel of Love" are left off, while the album tracks "Thunder Road, " "The River, " and "Atlantic City" and the minor chart single "Badlands" are included); and fifth, he has opted to include both a couple of new songs ("Secret Garden" and "Blood Brothers"), a previously unreleased outtake ("Murder Incorporated"), and a new recording of a previously unreleased old song ("This Hard Land"). All of which is to say that Greatest Hits is a hodge-podge that, while not without merit, is nevertheless unsatisfactory in several ways. Springsteen considered calling it something other than Greatest Hits (one idea: This Hard Land), and that might have been a better idea if he was going to fiddle with the concept this much. Some of Springsteen's best and best-known hit recordings are here - "Born to Run, " "Hungry Heart, " "Dancing in the Dark, " "Born in the U.S.A., " and the recent "Streets of Philadelphia, " the success of which probably prompted the release of a compilation. But many worthy tracks are missing, and the new selections don't justify the hoopla surrounding the surprising and temporary reunion of Springsteen's celebrated backup group, the E Street Band.

William Ruhlmann - All Music Guide



Bruce Springsteen is a peerless songwriter and consummate artist whose every painstakingly crafted album serves as an impassioned and literate pulse taking of a generation's fortunes. He is the foremost live performer in the history of rock & roll, a self-described prisoner of the music he loves, for whom every show is played as if it might be his last. Though some may argue the point, Springsteen single-handedly rescued rock & roll from its banal post-'60s doldrums. Moreover, his music developed a conscience that didn't ignore the darkening of the runaway American dream as the country greedily blundered its way through the '80s.

With the mighty exception of Born in the U.S.A., however – a veritable greatest-hits album in itself – Springsteen's standing as a singles artist has seemed an incidental byproduct of his main focus: arraying his songs in theme-driven album-length statements. For this reason, Greatest Hits comes across as a collection of familiar songs, each stellar in its own right, that somehow adds up to something less than the sum of its parts – even with the grafted-on bonus of four new tracks recorded with the E Street Band.

First of all, this album is not even what it purports to be. A straightforward program of Springsteen's greatest hits would at least have had the virtue of a governing logic. Although some Bruce-smitten critic blessed with second sight will no doubt divine a wishful thesis about the "story" it tells, the simple fact is that Greatest Hits liberally violates its stated premise. Absent for reasons unfathomable are five Top 10 hits ("Cover Me," "I'm Goin' Down," "I'm on Fire," "War" and "Tunnel of Love"), as well as such essential charting singles as "Prove It All Night" (No. 33), "Fade Away" (No. 20) and "One Step Up" (No. 13). Also missing is anything preceding "Born to Run," which leaves out a big chunk of the Springsteen story. If the album's assemblers could find reason to include "Atlantic City," which failed to crack the Top 100, surely there was room for "Blinded by the Light" and "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)." Those, too, rank among his greatest hits – ask anyone partial to FM radio or Springsteen concerts – despite the lack of corroboration from the charts.

In the early years of his career, a whole new palette of possibilities emerged from Springsteen's energetic vision – a playful, swinging landscape in which Bob Dylan met Roy Orbison at the Jersey Shore to a soundtrack produced by Phil Spector. All of that seemed to sour after Born to Run as Springsteen simultaneously fought a bruising legal battle with a former manager and tasted superstardom freighted with its share of hype. Thereafter, he began taking ever more penetrating and disillusioned looks into the troubled American psyche. His melancholy songs were often so intimate and personal (witness Nebraska) that the E Street Band eventually seemed an encumbrance, though he puffed out his chest for tours with them after the releases of Born in the U.S.A. and Tunnel of Love. In hindsight, Greatest Hits documents Springsteen's discomfort with the spotlight, the diminishing role of the E Street Band in his music and his rueful view of lives disintegrating against a backdrop of red, white and blues. After a certain point, he didn't want to be the Boss anymore.

By lining up a batch of Springsteen's biggest radio tracks, Greatest Hits unintentionally reveals a creaky, leaden quality that occasionally crept into the music he made in the post-Born to Run era. Plucked out of context, such popular hits as "Hungry Heart" and "Born in the U.S.A." sound stiff and muscle-bound now. The former is weighted by awkward lyrics ("Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack") that sentimentalize abandonment, the latter grinds a ponderous riff into the ground, and both are stamped with a metronomic snare sound that's leagues removed from the natural swing of the band circa The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle. The notion occurs that "Better Days," featuring one of Springsteen's most thoughtful lyrics, would have benefited from a subtler vocal treatment than the histrionic growl sustained throughout. And spanning 20 years, isolated from the albums that gave them meaning, these songs don't mix particularly well, nor do they portray a remarkable career in a flattering or accurate light. Every album Springsteen has made is best heard in toto; this vivisection is largely for dilettantes, come-latelies and radio programmers who wouldn't delve deeply anyway.

As for the four unreleased songs – three of them newly recorded with the E Street Band for this project – they sound more like a final coda than a new beginning. Two of them, "Secret Garden" and "Blood Brothers," are so restrained that the E Streeters' involvement adds nothing that session musicians couldn't have provided just as well with their competent anonymity. On "Blood Brothers," a barely electrified folk tune that recalls Dylan's Blood on the Tracks, Springsteen's harmonica is featured far more prominently than Clarence Clemons' sax or Nils Lofgren's guitar. The uptempo songs – "Murder Incorporated" and "This Hard Land" – don't restore or redefine the band members' roles in any way that suggests they have a future together. "Murder Incorporated" (originally recorded in 1982 and remixed for this album) is broad and bombastic enough to be a hit, while "This Hard Land" repeats some of Springsteen's most pronounced tics – the use of rivers, seeds and rides as metaphors, the contrived device of addressing his words to some fictional "sir." Musically it begs comparison with Woody Guthrie's populist folk songs.

This may, in fact, be where Springsteen is headed. It wouldn't be surprising if, on his next travels, he walked alone with a guitar and harmonica for companions.

PARKE PUTERBAUGH - Apr 6, 1995
Rolling Stone
 

 L y r i c s


Born To Run

In the day we sweat it out on the streets of a runaway American dream
At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines
Sprung from cages out on highway 9,
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected
and steppin' out over the line
Baby this town rips the bones from your back
It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we're young
'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

Wendy let me in I wanna be your friend
I want to guard your dreams and visions
Just wrap your legs 'round these velvet ribs
and strap your hands across my engines
Together we could break this trap
We'll run till we drop, baby we'll never go back
Will you walk with me out on the wire
'Cause baby I'm just a scared and lonely rider
But I gotta find out how it feels
I want to know if love is wild
babe I want to know if love is real

Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard
The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard
The amusement park rises bold and stark
Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist
I wanna die with you Wendy on the streets tonight
In an everlasting kiss

The highway's jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive
Everybody's out on the run tonight
but there's no place left to hide
Together Wendy we can live with the sadness
I'll love you with all the madness in my soul
Someday girl I don't know when
we're gonna get to that place
Where we really want to go
and we'll walk in the sun
But till then tramps like us, baby we were born to run (x3)


Thunder Road

The screen door slams
Mary's dress waves
Like a vision she dances across the porch
As the radio plays
Roy Orbison singing for the lonely
Hey that's me and I want you only
Don't turn me home again
I just can't face myself alone again
Don't run back inside
darling you know just what I'm here for
So you're scared and you're thinking
That maybe we ain't that young anymore
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You ain't a beauty, but hey you're alright
Oh and that's alright with me

You can hide 'neath your covers
And study your pain
Make crosses from your lovers
Throw roses in the rain
Waste your summer praying in vain
For a savior to rise from these streets
Well now I'm no hero
That's understood
All the redemption I can offer, girl
Is beneath this dirty hood
With a chance to make it good somehow
Hey what else can we do now
Except roll down the window
And let the wind blow back your hair
Well the night's busting open
These two lanes will take us anywhere
We got one last chance to make it real
To trade in these wings on some wheels
Climb in back
Heaven's waiting DOWN ON the tracks
Oh oh come take my hand
Riding out tonight to case the promised land
Oh oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road
oh Thunder Road
Lying out there like a killer in the sun
Hey I know it's late we can make it if we run
Oh Thunder Road, sit tight take hold
Thunder Road

Well I got this guitar
And I learned how to make it talk
And my car's out back
If you're ready to take that long walk
From your front porch to my front seat
The door's open but the ride it ain't free
And I know you're lonely
For words that I ain't spoken
But tonight we'll be free
All the promises'll be broken
There were ghosts in the eyes
Of all the boys you sent away
They haunt this dusty beach road
In the skeleton frames of burned out Chevrolets

They scream your name at night in the street
Your graduation gown lies in rags at their feet
And in the lonely cool before dawn
You hear their engines roaring on
But when you get to the porch they're gone
On the wind, so Mary climb in
It's a town full of losers
And I'm pulling out of here to win


Badlands

Lights out tonight
trouble in the heartland
Got a head-on collision
smashin' in my guts, man
I'm caught in a cross fire
that I don't understand
But there's one thing I know for sure girl
I don't give a damn
For the same old played out scenes
I don't give a damn
For just the in betweens
Honey, I want the heart, I want the soul
I want control right now
talk about a dream
Try to make it real
you wake up in the night
With a fear so real
spend your life waiting
for a moment that just don't come
Well, don't waste your time waiting

CHORUS
Badlands, you gotta live it everyday
Let the broken hearts stand
As the price you've gotta pay
We'll keep pushin' till it's understood
and these badlands start treating us good

Workin' in the fields
till you get your back burned
Workin' 'neath the wheels
till you get your facts learned
Baby I got my facts
learned real good right now
You better get it straight darling
Poor man wanna be rich,
rich man wanna be king
And a king ain't satisfied
till he rules everything
I wanna go out tonight,
I wanna find out what I got

Well I believe in the love that you gave me
I believe in the faith that could save me
I believe in the hope
and I pray that some day
It may raise me above these

CHORUS

mmmmmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmmm

For the ones who had a notion,
a notion deep inside
That it ain't no sin
to be glad you're alive
I wanna find one face
that ain't looking through me
I wanna find one place,
I wanna spit in the face of these badlands


The River

I come from down in the valley
where mister when you're young
They bring you up to do it like your daddy done
Me and Mary we met in high school
when she was just seventeen
We'd ride out of this valley down to where the fields were green

We'd go down to the river
And into the river we'd dive
Oh down to the river we'd ride

Then I got Mary pregnant
and man that was all she wrote
And for my nineteenth birthday I got a union card and a wedding coat
We went down to the courthouse
and the judge put it all to rest
No wedding day smiles no walk down the aisle
No flowers no wedding dress

That night we went down to the river
And into the river we'd dive
Oh down to the river we did ride

I got a job working construction for the Johnstown Company
But lately there ain't been much work on account of the economy
Now all them things that seemed so important
Well mister they vanished right into the air
Now I just act like I don't remember
Mary acts like she don't care

But I remember us riding in my brother's car
Her body tan and wet down at the reservoir
At night on them banks I'd lie awake
And pull her close just to feel each breath she'd take
Now those memories come back to haunt me
they haunt me like a curse
Is a dream a lie if it don't come true
Or is it something worse
that sends me down to the river
though I know the river is dry
That sends me down to the river tonight
Down to the river
my baby and I


Hungry Heart

Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack
I went out for a ride and I never went back
Like a river that don't know where it's flowing
I took a wrong turn and I just kept going

CHORUS
Everybody's got a hungry heart
Everybody's got a hungry heart
Lay down your money and you play your part
Everybody's got a hungry heart

I met her in a Kingstown bar
We fell in love I knew it had to end
We took what we had and we ripped it apart
Now here I am down in Kingstown again

CHORUS

Everybody needs a place to rest
Everybody wants to have a home
Don't make no difference what nobody says
Ain't nobody like to be alone


Atlantic City

Well they blew up the chicken man in Philly last night now they blew up his
house too
Down on the boardwalk they're gettin' ready for a fight gonna see what them
racket boys can do

Now there's trouble busin' in from outta state and the D.A. can't get no relief
Gonna be a rumble out on the promenade and the gamblin' commission's hangin' on
by the skin of its teeth

CHORUS
Well now everything dies baby that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies someday comes back
Put your makeup on fix your hair up pretty
And meet me tonight in Atlantic City

Well I got a job and tried to put my money away
But I got debts that no honest man can pay
So I drew what I had from the Central Trust
And I bought us two tickets on that Coast City bus

CHORUS

Now our luck may have died and our love may be cold but with you forever I'll
stay
We're goin' out where the sand's turnin' to gold so put on your stockin's baby
'cause the night's getting cold
And everything dies baby that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies someday comes back

Now I been lookin' for a job but it's hard to find
Down here it's just winners and losers and don't get caught on the wrong side of
that line
Well I'm tired of comin' out on the losin' end
So honey last night I met this guy and I'm gonna do a little favor for him
Well I guess everything dies baby that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies someday comes back
Put your hair up nice and set up pretty
and meet me tonight in Atlantic City
Meet me tonight in Atlantic City


Dancing In The Dark

I get up in the evening
and I ain't got nothing to say
I come home in the morning
I go to bed feeling the same way
I ain't nothing but tired
Man I'm just tired and bored with myself
Hey there baby, I could use just a little help

You can't start a fire
You can't start a fire without a spark
This gun's for hire
even if we're just dancing in the dark

Message keeps getting clearer
radio's on and I'm moving 'round the place
I check my look in the mirror
I wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face
Man I ain't getting nowhere
I'm just living in a dump like this
There's something happening somewhere
baby I just know that there is

You can't start a fire
you can't start a fire without a spark
This gun's for hire
even if we're just dancing in the dark

You sit around getting older
there's a joke here somewhere and it's on me
I'll shake this world off my shoulders
come on baby this laugh's on me

Stay on the streets of this town
and they'll be carving you up alright
They say you gotta stay hungry
hey baby I'm just about starving tonight
I'm dying for some action
I'm sick of sitting 'round here trying to write this book
I need a love reaction
come on now baby gimme just one look

You can't start a fire sitting round crying over a broken heart
This gun's for hire
Even if we're just dancing in the dark
You can't start a fire worrying about your little world falling apart
This gun's for hire
Even if we're just dancing in the dark
Even if we're just dancing in the dark
Even if we're just dancing in the dark
Even if we're just dancing in the dark


Born In The U.S.A.

Born down in a dead man's town
The first kick I took was when I hit the ground
You end up like a dog that's been beat too much
Till you spend half your life just covering up, now
Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A
Born in the U.S.A, now

Got in a little hometown jam
So they put a rifle in my hands
Sent me off to a foreign land, to go and kill the yellow man
Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A

Come back home to the refinery
Hiring man said "Son if it was up to me"
Went down to see my V.A. man,
He said "Son don't you understand now"
I had a brother at Khe Sahn, fighting off the Viet cong
They're still there, he's all gone

He had a woman who lived in Saigon,
I got a picture of him in her arms, uhh

Down in the shadow of the peni-tentiary
Out by the - gas fires of the - refinery
I'm - ten years burning - down the road
Nowhere to run ain't, got nowhere to go

Born in the U.S.A, I was
Born in the U.S.A, now
Born in the U.S.A, I'm a long gone daddy in the U.S.A, now

Born in the U.S.A
Born in the U.S.A
Born in the U.S.A, I'm a cool rockin' daddy, I'm a U.S.A., now


My Hometown

I was eight years old and running with a dime in my hand
Into the bus stop to pick up a paper for my old man
I'd sit on his lap in that big old Buick and steer as we drove through town
He'd tousle my hair and say son take a good look around this is your hometown
This is your hometown
This is your hometown
This is your hometown

In '65 tension was running high at my high school
There was a lot of fights between the black and white
There was nothing you could do
Two cars at a light on a Saturday night in the back seat there was a gun
Words were passed in a shotgun blast
Troubled times had come to my hometown
My hometown
My hometown
My hometown

Now Main Street's whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there ain't nobody wants to come down here no more
They're closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks
Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they ain't coming back to your
hometown
Your hometown
Your hometown
Your hometown

Last night me and Kate we laid in bed
talking about getting out
Packing up our bags maybe heading south
I'm thirty-five we got a boy of our own now
Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said son take a good look around, this is your hometown


Glory Days

I had a friend was a big baseball player
back in high school
He could throw that speedball by you
Make you look like a fool boy
Saw him the other night at this roadside bar
I was walking in, he was walking out
We went back inside sat down had a few drinks
but all he kept talking about was

Chorus:
Glory days well they'll pass you by
Glory days in the wink of a young girl's eye
Glory days, glory days

Well there's a girl that lives up the block
back in school she could turn all the boy's heads
Sometimes on a Friday I'll stop by
and have a few drinks after she put her kids to bed
Her and her husband Bobby well they split up
I guess it's two years gone by now
We just sit around talking about the old times,
she says when she feels like crying
she starts laughing thinking about

Chorus

My old man worked 20 years on the line
and they let him go
Now everywhere he goes out looking for work
they just tell him that he's too old
I was 9 nine years old and he was working at the
Metuchen Ford plant assembly line
Now he just sits on a stool down at the Legion hall
but I can tell what's on his mind

Glory days yeah goin back
Glory days aw he ain't never had
Glory days, glory days

Now I think I'm going down to the well tonight
and I'm going to drink till I get my fill
And I hope when I get old I don't sit around thinking about it
but I probably will
Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture
a little of the glory of, well time slips away
and leaves you with nothing mister but
boring stories of glory days

Chorus (repeat twice)

assorted all rights, oh yeahs, come on nows, hoots, etc til fade


Brilliant Disguise

I hold you in my arms
as the band plays
What are those words whispered baby
just as you turn away
I saw you last night
out on the edge of town
I wanna read your mind
To know just what I've got in this new thing I've found
So tell me what I see
when I look in your eyes
Is that you baby
or just a brilliant disguise

I heard somebody call your name
from underneath our willow
I saw something tucked in shame
underneath your pillow
Well I've tried so hard baby
but I just can't see
What a woman like you
is doing with me
So tell me who I see
when I look in your eyes
Is that you baby
or just a brilliant disguise

Now look at me baby
struggling to do everything right
And then it all falls apart
when out go the lights
I'm just a lonely pilgrim
I walk this world in wealth
I want to know if it's you I don't trust
'cause I damn sure don't trust myself

Now you play the loving woman
I'll play the faithful man
But just don't look too close
into the palm of my hand
We stood at the alter
the gypsy swore our future was right
But come the wee wee hours
Well maybe baby the gypsy lied
So when you look at me
you better look hard and look twice
Is that me baby
or just a brilliant disguise

Tonight our bed is cold
I'm lost in the darkness of our love
God have mercy on the man
Who doubts what he's sure of


Human Touch

You and me we were the pretenders
We let it all slip away
In the end what you don't surrender
Well the world just strips away

Girl, ain't no kindness in the face of strangers
Ain't gonna find no miracles here
Well you can wait on your blesses my darlin'
But I got a deal for you right here

I ain't lookin' for praise or pity
I ain't comin' 'round searchin' for a crush
I just want someone to talk to
And a little of that Human Touch
Just a little of that Human Touch

Ain't no mercy on the streets of this town
Ain't no bread from heavenly skies
Ain't nobody drawin' wine from this blood
It's just you and me tonight

Tell me, in a world without pity
Do you think what I'm askin's too much
I just want something to hold on to
And a little of that Human Touch
Just a little of that Human Touch

Oh girl that feeling of safety you prize
Well it comes at a hard hard price
You can't shut off the risk and the pain
Without losin' the love that remains
We're all riders on this train

So you've been broken and you've been hurt
Show me somebody who ain't
Yeah, I know I ain't nobody's bargain
But, hell, a little touchup
and a little paint...

You might need somethin' to hold on to
When all the answers, they don't amount to much
Somebody that you could just to talk to
And a little of that Human Touch

Baby, in a world without pity
Do you think what I'm askin's too much
I just want to feel you in my arms
Share a little of that Human Touch (x2)
Feel a little of that Human Touch


Better Days

Well my soul checked out missing as I sat listening
To the hours and minutes tickin' away
Yeah, just sittin' around waitin' for my life to begin
While it was all just slippin' away.
I'm tired of waitin' for tomorrow to come
Or that train to come roarin' 'round the bend
I got a new suit of clothes a pretty red rose
And a woman I can call my friend

These are better days baby
Yeah there's better days shining through
These are better days baby
Better days with a girl like you

Well I took a piss at fortune's sweet kiss
It's like eatin' caviar and dirt
It's a sad funny ending to find yourself pretending
A rich man in a poor man's shirt
Now my ass was draggin' when from a passin' gypsy wagon
Your heart like a diamond shone
Tonight I'm layin' in your arms carvin' lucky charms
Out of these heard luck bones

These are better days baby
These are better days it's true
These are better days
There's better days shining through

Now a life of leisure and a pirate's treasure
Don't make much for tragedy
But it's a sad man my friend who's livin' in his own skin
And can't stand the company
Every fool's got a reason to feelin' sorry for himself
And turn his heart to stone
Tonight this fool's halfway to heaven and just a mile outta hell
And I feel like I'm comin' home

These are better days baby
There's better days shining through
These are better days
Better days with a girl like you

These are better days baby
These are better days it's true
These are better days


Streets Of Philadelphia

I was bruised and battered and I couldn't tell
what I felt
I was unrecognizable to myself
Saw my reflection in a window I didn't know
my own face
Oh brother are you gonna leave me
wasting away
On the streets of Philadelphia

I walked the avenue till my legs felt like stone
I heard the voices of friends vanished and gone
At night I could hear the blood in my veins
Just as black and whispering as the rain
On the streets of Philadelphia

Ain't no angel gonna greet me
It's just you and I my friend
And my clothes don't fit me no more
I walked a thousand miles
just to slip this skin

The night has fallen, I'm lyin' awake
I can feel myself fading away
So receive me brother with your faithless kiss
or will we leave each other alone like this
On the streets of Philadelphia


Murder Incorporated

Bobby's got a gun that he keeps beneath his pillow
Out on the street your chances are zero
Take a look around you (come on down)
It ain't too complicated
You're messin' with Murder Incorporated

Now you check over your shoulder everywhere that you go
Walkin' down the street, there's eyes in every shadow
You better take a look around you (come on down)
That equipment you got's so outdated
You can't compete with Murder Incorporated
Everywhere you look now, Murder Incorporated

So you keep a little secret down deep inside your dresser drawer
From dealing with the heat you're feelin' down on the killin' floor
No matter where you step you feel you're never out of danger
So the comfort that you keep's a gold-plated snub-nose thirty-two
I heard that you

You got a job downtown, man it leaves your head cold
And everywhere you look life ain't got no soul
That apartment you live in feels like it's just a place to hide
When your walkin' down the streets you won't meet no one eye to eye
The cops reported you as just another homicide
But I can tell that you was just frustrated
from livin' with Murder Incorporated

Everywhere you look now
Murder Incorporated


Secret Garden

She'll let you in her house
If you come knockin' late at night
She'll let you in her mouth
If the words you say are right
If you pay the price
She'll let you deep inside
But there's a secret garden she hides

She'll let you in her car
To go drivin' round
She'll let you into the parts of herself
That'll bring you down
She'll let you in her heart
If you got a hammer and a vise
But into her secret garden, don't think twice

You've gone a million miles
How far'd you get
To that place where you can't remember
And you can't forget

She'll lead you down a path
There'll be tenderness in the air
She'll let you come just far enough
So you know she's really there
She'll look at you and smile
And her eyes will say
She's got a secret garden
Where everything you want
Where everything you need
Will always stay
A million miles away


Blood Brothers

We played king of the mountain out on the end
The world come chargin' up the hill, and we were women and men
Now there's so much that time, time and memory fade away
We got our own roads to ride and chances we gotta take
We stood side by side each one fightin' for the other
We said until we died we'd always be blood brothers

Now the hardness of this world slowly grinds your dreams away
Makin' a fool's joke out of the promises we make
And what once seemed black and white turns to so many shades of gray
We lose ourselves in work to do and bills to pay
And it's a ride, ride, ride, and there ain't much cover
With no one runnin' by your side my blood brother

On through the houses of the dead past those fallen in their tracks
Always movin' ahead and never lookin' back
Now I don't know how I feel, I don't know how I feel tonight
If I've fallen 'neath the wheel, if I've lost or I've gained sight
I don't even know why, I don't know why I made this call
Or if any of this matters anymore after all

But the stars are burnin' bright like some mystery uncovered
I'll keep movin' through the dark with you in my heart


This Hard Land

Hey there mister can you tell me
What happened to the seeds I've sown
Can you give me a reason, sir, as to why they've never grown
They've just blown around from town to town
Back out on these fields
Where they fall from my hand
Back into the dirt of this hard land

Well me and my sister
From Germantown we did ride
We made our bed, sir
From the rock on the mountainside
We been blowin' around from town to town
Lookin' for a place to stand
Where the sun burst through the clouds and fall like a circle
A circle of fire down on this hard land

Now even the rain it don't come 'round
Don't come 'round here no more
And the only sound at night's the wind
Slammin' the back porch door
Yeah it stirs you up like it wants to blow you down
Twistin' and churnin' up the sand
Leavin' all them scarecrows lyin' facedown
In the dirt of this hard land

From a building up on the hill
I can hear a tape deck blastin' "Home on the Range"
I can hear them Bar-M choppers
Sweepin' low across the plains
It's me and you, Frank, we're lookin' for lost cattle
Our hooves twistin' and churnin' up the sand
We're ridin' in the whirlwind searchin' for lost treasure
Way down south of the Rio Grande
We're ridin' 'cross that river in the moonlight
Up onto the banks of this hard land

Hey, Frank, won't you pack your bags
And meet me tonight down at Liberty Hall
Just one kiss from you, my brother
And we'll ride until we fall
Well sleep in the fields
We'll sleep by the rivers
And in the morning we'll make a plan
Well if you can't make it stay hard, stay hungry, stay alive if you can
 

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